How to Engage in Politics…Without Losing Your Mind
When Engaging in Politics is Hard
I want to take a step back from the news cycle, because – as you know – we are in an election year! This means we need to talk about candidates in the running for Governor of California, ballot propositions, and the overall direction of our state. But, before we do that, I want to acknowledge something important. Because while I believe that most people would agree on paper that politics matter and that we should be voting, I have also heard a consensus from friends, Christians, and other women specifically that what keeps them from engaging in politics on a more consistent basis is the fact that politics are overwhelming. The news cycle is a lot. Trying to keep up with what is happening, especially when what is happening is divisive or depressing, is both stressful and unsustainable.
I hear that, and that is a very real barrier to politics today – especially when you may already feel stretched to your limit with your job, with your kids, with managing your household, doing the dishes, feeding your family, trying to get together with friends, serving at your church, and all of the other many responsibilities that you manage.
When you’re trying to raise your own children, it is anxiety-inducing to read headlines about other people’s children being murdered by illegal immigrants.
When you’re trying to be faithful in your own job, it is depressing to read about a potential recession and bleak job market.
When you’re trying to get to know new people at your church or in your community, it is hard to not let your views on every topic across the political spectrum get in the way of seeing them as people and finding common ground.
And ultimately, when there is chaos in the world around you – when there are decisions being made that you have literally no say in or no control over, when the state you live in slides further and further into progressivism, when your legislature passes bad laws that you don’t agree with and wouldn’t have approved of if asked – when you feel completely out of control about all of it, then it seems like the easier choice, the wiser choice, to step back from it, in a way to “protect your own peace.”
If that sounds like you, then I want to speak directly to you today. Because I believe that everyone – all Americans – should be informed about and engaged in the very politics that shape the world around them, and I believe that is especially true for Christians. BUT just preaching the principled necessity of engaging in politics is not enough to practically help those who feel burdened by it. In effect, the question I want to help answer for you is not why, but how to engage in politics, and how to do so without losing your mind.
To some extent, we all go through this. Even if you are the most politically active person, and you love it, there will inevitably be seasons where it feels like too much, where it burns you out, and where you feel more discouraged than encouraged. As a result, I don’t want to ignore or brush off this very practical question. I also don’t want to answer it by saying “just care about your country more”, or “just suck it up and try harder” so-to-speak. Instead, I want to offer practical insights on how an average, everyday citizen can show up for their community and interact with the political sphere without it taking over their life or affecting their mental, physical, and emotional health.
Common Misconceptions About Politics
The first thing I want to do is reframe and actually define what it means to be informed and what it means to engage in politics. I think the first place we go wrong when it comes to politics is by making our engagement something it shouldn’t or doesn’t need to be and then getting frustrated when that system doesn’t work for us. So, what do I really mean when I tell you to engage in politics, and what do I not mean?
The first misconception is that engaging in politics means engaging extensively with social media. This is how I think most of my generation and perhaps the generation before me believes they engage politically. This is actually supported by recent studies. Over 50% to 85% of Gen Z in the United States use social media as their primary source of news, with roughly half of them using it daily for their news updates.[1] In society today, people have begun to see posting their opinions, arguing in people’s comment sections, sharing new headlines, or reposting political content as participation in the political process itself. But consuming and reacting to political content online is not the same thing as participating in politics.
Social media creates the feeling of engagement without many of the things that make political engagement meaningful. It’s fast, emotional, and constant. The algorithms reward outrage, conflict, and, quite frankly, drama, because those are the things that keep people scrolling and interacting. The result is that political participation becomes less about truly understanding issues or influencing real outcomes and more about reacting to whatever controversy is trending that day. In other words, social media turns politics into a kind of endless commentary cycle.
And it’s everywhere you look! Good luck trying to have an Instagram account just to keep up with friends and family. If you move to the explore page for any amount of time, it’s likely you’ll see something political, and once you see one thing, you start to see more. Now, don’t get me wrong, social media is a great way to share a message with your followers – so if you want to post a headline or want to share your thoughts on policy to your account, that is not a bad thing! But we can’t think this alone means political engagement, and we shouldn’t see it as mandatory for someone to be informed about politics. I know several people in my life who choose not to have social media, or to severely limit it – and I believe they can be just as informed and just as engaged in their communities and in the politics that affect them!
Real political engagement looks very different from a constant new cycle – and thank goodness it does, because endless commentary is exhausting! It’s often slower, quieter, and far less visible online. It looks like understanding how policies affect your community, paying attention to local elections, contacting representatives, volunteering for causes you care about, and simply taking the time to read beyond headlines and think logically about the arguments being made by politicians and legislators. That doesn’t require social media, and it is often best done off of social media.
Similar to that, another misconception is that to be informed, you must spend hours and hours either watching the news or doing research. That, understandably, would drive anyone crazy! But I see this so often – that people feel this pressure to keep up with everything: every breaking story, every political controversy, every new development in the federal government or on the world stage. Add to that the fact that the news cycle moves so quickly now, that if you step away for even a day or two, it can feel like you’re suddenly behind on everything happening!
But the truth is that being informed doesn’t require constant consumption. The modern news environment guarantees that if you engage with it constantly, you will hit information overload. News outlets, cable networks, and online platforms all want people to stay tuned in for as long as possible. This means that the news is a tool to be used at your disposal, but not the main component for you to keep up with every day as your source of information.
For most people, the best way to stay informed about politics is through a small amount of intentional attention. This looks like reading a few well-reported articles on topics relevant to you, listening to a thoughtful podcast that breaks down in depth what is happening, or checking in on the major developments of the week once, not every day. That is usually more than enough to understand what’s happening.
So, if you feel overwhelmed by the news, if it is a source of anxiety, then I want you to hear me when I say: you don’t have to follow politics all day long to be an informed citizen. In many cases, limiting how much news you consume actually helps you understand issues more clearly, because you’re focusing on key information instead of an overwhelming amount of noise.
Real Engagement Defined
Those are the main misconceptions and pitfalls of what it does not mean to engage in politics. On the flip side, what do I mean when I say we should be informed and engaged? Being informed means having a basic understanding of the issues that affect your community, your state, and your country. It means knowing enough about what’s happening to make thoughtful decisions when it comes time to vote, and most importantly, to form your own opinions rather than just reacting to the loudest voices online.
We see a lack of this in our society today, and especially in our state. We see people who vote one way because it’s the way they’ve always voted, or because it’s the way their parents or their friends vote, or because they just vote for a political party regardless of the outcomes of those policies. That is not the way to preserve our democracy! I wish more people – especially young people – asked tougher questions of their leaders and their legislators. I wish more people refused to form their political opinions based on headlines, celebrities, and what is promised to them in the short term and instead focused on what is actually good and beneficial in the long-term for themselves and their communities.
This means participating in the actual processes that shape public life – things like voting, paying attention to local elections, supporting causes you care about, and taking the time to learn more deeply about issues that affect you and matter to you. In other words, political engagement is not about constant consumption or constant commentary. It’s about intentional participation. I believe that when you approach politics this way, more deliberately and less reactively, then it becomes much easier to stay informed without letting it consume your entire mental space and overwhelm your life.
Practical Tips
Now that we’ve defined political engagement and addressed some of the misconceptions that I believe lead to burnout, I also want to get really practical. Here are a few things that have helped me stay informed without letting politics consume my life.
First, set boundaries with politics. Think about every other demanding area of your life – work, school, family responsibilities. In all those areas, you likely set some type of boundaries. There is nothing that you can be consumed by 100% of the time without eventually burning out. As humans, we need rest, and we need breaks. In the same way you probably don’t stay late at the office every single day while leaving your spouse or family at home, you also don’t need to be “in politics” every moment of every day.
How this looks will be different for everyone, but it can help to intentionally block off time where you’re not thinking about, reading about, talking about, or listening to politics. Maybe that means stepping away from your phone or certain news apps, or maybe it means you only listen to your political podcasts on certain days. For me personally, this mostly looks like limiting social media. My entire X feed is political news and drama, and a lot of the accounts I follow on Instagram are similar, so it’s very easy to get pulled into it constantly.
One thing that has helped me a lot is something called The Brick – this isn’t an ad, it’s just genuinely what works for me. It locks certain apps on my phone, including social media and news outlets, whenever I “brick” it. That way I’m not accidentally consuming political content all day long. Instead, I have specific times where I check updates from a few accounts, and then I turn it back off. Honestly, that has been huge for me mentally. It protects me from the constant outrage cycle and some of the uglier sides of politics. It even applies to this podcast. I only release one episode per week. If I tried to do more than that with a full-time job and normal life responsibilities, I’d be researching, writing, and recording constantly – and I would burn out very quickly.
Setting boundaries means giving yourself space so that politics stays something you engage with intentionally, not something that consumes your entire day.
Second, pay attention to your capacity and avoid an all-or-nothing mindset. As humans, we’re prone to getting excited about something and trying to do it constantly – and then when we burn out, we abandon it entirely. That can happen very easily with politics.
A better approach is slow, consistent engagement that builds over time. That starts with understanding what you can realistically handle. It’s normal for that to fluctuate – there will be times when you can take in more and times when you need to take in less. The key is learning to recognize your signals and actually listening to them.
For me, there are weeks where I can do more – maybe there’s a lot happening in California that I want to research, so I’m reading and writing more. But one of my signals is when I start feeling really pessimistic or fatalistic about the state of the world. When I start feeling like I’m just shouting into the void, that’s when I know I need to step back. At that point I might step away from the news, spend time in Scripture, or spend time with friends – things that actually invigorate me. When I do that, sooner rather than later, I’m usually able to come back refreshed and ready to engage again.
Third, don’t engage in politics alone – find good resources and good voices to help you. It’s okay to ask for help! Not everyone needs to be researching politics as much as I do, just like I don’t need to research it as much as professional political commentators. We all have different passions and capacities, so find people and resources that help you stay informed.
For example, if you’re a busy mom and you don’t have time to dive into the economic implications of a new housing law in California, that’s okay. Find a good podcast, a good book, or a trusted friend who has already done some of that work and can help break it down for you. That was actually my heart in creating this podcast – not just to yap about politics online, but to create a resource for my church and for fellow Californians. I want to do a lot of the research so you don’t have to, and there are many other great resources out there that do the same thing.
Of course, this requires discernment. You can’t outsource your critical thinking to other people, and it can take time to find voices you trust. But once you do, it becomes much easier to stay informed and think through issues clearly. A few resources I’ve appreciated include Allie Beth Stuckey and her podcast Relatable, as well as her latest book Toxic Empathy. She has covered literally hundreds of topics and breaks them down in a clear and biblical manner. The Morning Wire podcast is fantastic for quick daily news updates, my husband listens to it every day and I can attest it is thorough yet brief. For complex political topics, I have found Ben Shapiro to be phenomenal, he does a good job of cutting through the noise and explaining the facts behind major issues – and he’s just super intelligent. And if none of those are your style, then Al Mohler with The Briefing is a solid resource and great place to start!
But honestly, the most valuable help for me comes from real relationships with other believers who think deeply about these issues. Scripture tells us that iron sharpens iron, and having a community that challenges you, offers perspective, and ultimately points you back to the Bible is far more valuable than any podcast. That kind of community usually starts in a strong local church.
Fourth, view political engagement as a gradual process, not an overnight one. Would you believe that back in 2020 I barely knew anything about politics? I voted in the general election, but I didn’t even watch the results or pay much attention to what was happening. Getting from that point to where I am now took years of slowly building a knowledge base about politics and key issues.
You don’t have to become an expert overnight. Instead, pick a few topics you want to understand better and start building your knowledge slowly. If you want to understand economics, for example, you could read Basic Economics by Thomas Sowell. The point is to grow your understanding gradually instead of trying to learn everything at once.
Which leads into my fifth tip: start with your sphere of influence. You don’t have to fully understand what’s happening in China or Ukraine today, and you don’t even have to follow every detail of the federal government. Start with the issues that affect the place where you actually live. That’s one reason I focus on California politics. There are plenty of resources covering national news, but it’s just as important to understand what’s happening in your own city, county, and state.
Look at the issues that directly affect your life. If you’re a parent, learn about the policies shaping your child’s education. If you care about housing, start looking into the laws that affect affordability. Start with what’s around you and expand outward from there. And give yourself the freedom to focus on the areas you’re genuinely interested in. You don’t have to care equally about every political issue. Personally, I love economics – looking at budgets, taxes, and economic policy. But other topics, like education statistics or healthcare policy, are harder for me to stay engaged with. Those issues are still important, but it’s okay to spend less time on the things that drain you and invest more time becoming knowledgeable about the things you actually enjoy studying.
Lastly, and most importantly, keep perspective on what really matters. At the end of the day, what matters most is your faithfulness before God. The reality is that we will only make change insofar as the God we serve sees fit. Our actions matter – God often uses ordinary people as the means through which He works – but the outcome ultimately belongs to Him. So, we surrender our efforts to His will and rest in that truth.
Even amid frustration or disappointment, we have hope, because this is ultimately our Father’s world. He reigns over everything that happens in Los Angeles, in California, and in the United States. As much as I love politics, the church is my life. My husband and I serve in ministries at our church, spend time regularly with families from our congregation, and participate in weekly Bible studies. I also have the incredible privilege of studying Scripture deeply with dear friends each week. Being grounded in the Word and surrounded by faithful community keeps my perspective where it should be.
Politics is one part of my life, but it is not my highest calling, and it is not my god. So, when I feel anxious, frustrated, or discouraged about our state, I bring those things to the feet of Jesus. I trust that He sees farther than I do and is working all things together for His glory and for our good.
Your faith should inform your politics. It should help guide how you engage with the world. But it should also protect you from being consumed by it.
Final Thoughts
So, prepare yourself! As we walk into a very politically active next few months – not just in California but on a nationwide level as well – I hope I have given you some practical tools in your arsenal for how to engage in the news and political conversations happening around you.
If there’s one thing you take from today, let it be this – just don’t give up. Keep trying! Find new methods that work for you and new resources that help you. Figure out what your passions are and get to work on slowly growing your understanding of political topics. There will be setbacks and pitfalls along the way, but just don’t stop!
When your emotions fail you, when you start to wane in your resolve, fall back on the principles you know to be true – that America, and California specifically, are worth fighting for. Our democracy is only preserved through the proactive efforts of everyday Americans like you and me who understand what threats are being posed to her and speak up in defense of her. If we disengage from that, we don’t just affect ourselves or our children, we affect the people around us, our state, and our nation.
I’ll leave you with the words of Jeremiah 29:
“This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: “Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. And seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.”
This is our responsibility, given to us by God – to seek the good of those around us. He will give us the grace to do, but we must be faithful to try.
References:
[1] Fruehauf, Katie. “WHAT THE DATA SAY: 85% of Young People Get Their News From Social Media - Stagwell.” Stagwell, October 15, 2025. https://www.stagwellglobal.com/what-the-data-say-85-of-young-people-get-their-news-from-social-media/.
Resources mentioned in this article:
· Basic Economics — Thomas Sowell
· Relatable Podcast — Allie Beth Stuckey
· Morning Wire Podcast
· The Ben Shapiro Show
· Toxic Empathy — Allie Beth Stuckey
· Church Finders: https://tms.edu/find-a-church/, https://churches.efca.org/
